women, how often in your day do you find yourself talking or thinking about men? feminine people, can you count the moments you dedicate to longing for the masculine? well guess what, while we’re thinking on them, they steady talking shit about us. a inquiry into how men are feeling about women, dispatch from brooklyn, ny.

church avenue blanketed in white snow, flatbush moving just a little slower, so as to not fall over, oooh this icy land. two conversations with the men folk of brooklyn: i’m song hunting at the mix cd store on church; i’m waiting to get my line nice at brooklyn’s finest, a barbershop on cortelyou. both places had good men talking bad about women.

oh, they just try to trick us to get pregnant, telling us they got the shot but now i’m a father! man, all women want is the money, you should never give a woman a ring, just give her enough money to keep her in the house.

both places i spoke up for us sisters. why the birth control burden gotta be on us? what about the gold digging men?

look, the fact is, there are women who are pros at screwing over men, and vice versa. also, in a patriarchal system, all men benefit from a physically enforced political reality that siphons off more power, visibility, voice and money to men. i left the mix cd spot and the barbershop with the feeling that men don’t know how to believe in women. even though there are stellar women to believe in. of course we must believe in ourselves, that is first and foremost our path as women. but it would be nice to have the support of the masculine, by our side as we fly.

sigh. i believe we basically love each other despite and because of all we have to navigate through. but sprinkle in some real assholes on both sides of the borders and you got yourself a war.

audre lourde said poetry is not a luxury. maybe because it is a border/less terrain wherein we are still jagged petals, soft and hard, riffing with the all too human potential for fraught but safe love.

on that bluesy note: march love poems. from a writer who had every reason not to ever open up her body to good loving again. but did, and does. celebrate international women’s day with the world: march 8.

one thing about driving in new york, you have to know how to speed up to slow down. i suggest you do the same to truly enjoy the holiday season.

you’re in a car curving around grand army plaza, waiting with bated breath, foot poised over the gas peddle, light turns green, and their off! until the next block, where a perfectly visible red light has been waiting for you the entire time. so you slam on the breaks, especially if you’re a dollar van barreling down flatbush ave, and bring your ride to unnecessary, whiplash halt. proceed in this manner all the way to your destination. you’ll get there in the same amount of time it woulda taken you if your foot was easier on the gas (if your breath was more even, if your mind was more peace) but you’ll have the added benefit of being good and stressed. i guarantee you that if you speed up to slow down all the way to your next move (or your last move) you’ll arrive having cultivated a whole next level degree of disassociation and impatience.

this is a perfect perscription for feeling big, bad, and righteous. which we all need to feel. when we are being total assholes to ourselves and the world around us.

attention all holiday shoppers. whether you’re shopping for goods or just a good, peaceful time: keep speeding up to slow down. cuz its so ineffective it works. free, painful armor, load up people, its the ultimate black friday dizz-eal!

honestly, why pace yourself? pacing yourself from here to new years will just mean you get to be present, that you get to be in your body, sit with your feelings, remember all your actions, that you’ll be gently and compassionately compelled towards accountability. its all fucked off.

lead to the pedal baby. do it. press on the gas. because it works so good. don’t it.